Print This Page Email This Page
SEIU Building

MN Court Rules Franken won Senate Seat

SEIU Healthcare Minnesota members celebrate victory for working families and renew battle for quality, affordable healthcare, and a voice in the workplace

The Minnesota Supreme Court ruled on Tuesday that Democrat Al Franken won the Senate seat that has remained vacant since the November election.

Now that Franken will be seated, we can focus our efforts on building an economy that works for everyone. SEIU Healthcare Minnesota members are expanding their efforts by the hour to fight for the Employee Free Choice Act and Healthcare reform.

Couriers Win Big at Allina

In July 2007 the Allina Couriers began a project to determine the feasibility of in-sourcing all courier work within Allina after noticing subcontracted couriers following them on their routes and duplicating work.

After a two year project through the Strategic Alliance, and spending countless hours circulating petitions and looking for additional cost savings ideas for the employer, the third party ruling regarding the Allina Courier Subcontracting dispute has arrived and is in our favor.

The ruling states that Allina does not meet the specific needs to subcontract the Couriers; through their diligent and persistent work the Allina Couriers can move forward and feel secure in their workplace again.

This is a great victory for the Allina Couriers and our members!

One thing safe in health reform: Jobs

Below, read the Op-ed by SEIU Healthcare Minnesota Assistant Organizing Director Phillip Cryan recently published on the Star Tribune site.

The debate over health care reform includes a bewildering array of contentious and consequential policy questions. It's easy to get lost just trying to keep up with the terminology -- a "public option," health cooperatives, individual mandate, fee-for-service, risk pools, guaranteed issue -- never mind evaluating which policies to support and which to oppose.

While the public option has become the most vigorously debated of these questions, and rightly so, another policy generating a lot of political heat is the "employer mandate." Requiring employers to either provide quality health insurance to their employees or pay a payroll tax to help fund public provision of health insurance is a controversial proposal, yet one deemed crucial for comprehensive reform by the Obama administration and key Democrats in the House and Senate.

Read the original op-ed at:
http://www.startribune.com/opinion/commentary/48932497.html?page=1&c=y

» Read the full article